grahamhobbs wrote:
Pelmetman, we are of the generation that was brought up to work, that work maketh a man. But we grew up at a time when the economy was good, there was lots of jobs, there were opportunities, if you wanted you could push the door and it opened. Many working class families prospered and got on. I have lived and worked in London all my life, it has changed dramatically, from being a massive industrial town with strong communities, the communities have been ripped apart, there is no industry (the last vestiges in the East End have been wiped out by the Olympic park), you in the main either work in the city or in low paid unskilled work (there's been a massive increase in the rich employing servants), with no way out. I see the kids around me, they've got to be exceptional to push the door open and for young black guys especially the door must be slammed in their face every day.

Not quite Graham ........I left school in 1974, remember the 3day week, power cuts, and a much worse recession than now..............Not exactly a time of plenty
As you say you have spent all your time in London.........quite why is beyond me, I cant stand the place
London in common with many cities have the same problems. Which one of the reasons my family moved out decades ago. It seems like the problems are still the same why stay when there are plenty of other places to live and work

Do you really think so, Graham? If that's how I came across, then I must apologise to you in a way. On the other hand, it has been my experience that the way to deal with strident political opinion is to be equally strident. I think you're partly wrong - as far as I can see, there are people who do exactly what you tell me they're not doing, which is defending mindless criminals. If you want to support that position, that's your own business, and I won't shout about it - at least, not until you tell me that it's the way the world works and I should just put up and shut up, at which point I will kick and scream with the best of them.

Of course I'm being strident. In the face of a defence of idiotic violence, I will always be strident. I will shout to the rafters that this is wrong, wrong, wrong. I will not be the one to explain to Nomada that all of this is merely an expression of frustrated, underprivileged youth and that she has to put up with it. I will not be the one who tells streetfuls of shopkeepers that it was, basically, all their own fault because they attempted to make a living when all around them were these poor, poor people who were in such desperate need of an iPod. I will not be the one who sits back when the country surrenders its authority, built up over centuries by people who really DID make a sacrifice, to an unintelligent yowling mob of subhumans. Does that maybe explain how I feel?

I've already posted a little bit about people who did what they had to do in the past. They complained, certainly, and possibly even kicked and screamed themselves - but I'm sure I don't have to tell you what they didn't do. They didn't because they recognised that, like it or not, any society has a bottom layer - even Utopia would have a bottom layer. The secret - although I see no reason why it should be a secret given that so many people have utilised it in the past - is to plough your way, using any legal method available, into a better position. That's what a free society is actually about - the ability to use one's own efforts to create change. There are a number of people who claim to be democrats who completely fail to understand this basic point.

I am NOT (upper case) the one who posted the words, also in upper case, LISTEN and UNDERSTAND. If you want stridency and political dictatorship, than I suggest you take it up with that person. In the meantime, I shall continue to be my normal calm self, only exploding into activity when I come across the claptrap which is accepted today as studied political opinion. As I've already said, my 84-year year old Mum knew better than that.

Mike

EDIT: Ah - the point I forgot. I most certainly do not have to ask myself any such question as "Why now?" Why should I waste my time? If there was one iota of political impetus behind this outpouring of support for simple criminal activity, than I might consider it. For sheer thuggery, I have better things to do.

MKG wrote:..............................................
Of course I'm being strident. In the face of a defence of idiotic violence, I will always be strident.

MKG, sorry but you are doing it again. I have reread the posts again, I can find no one who has defended the actions of the rioters. Various people have tried to put it into a context, what is the background, why did it happen, etc. Trying to understand something is not to defend it. When the National Front or British Defence League march or make gains in elections, because I try to discuss and understand why young people support them, I am not defending them. Fascism is incomprehensible to me, as perhaps these rioters are to you, but I believe you can't change something unless you understand it.

You ask why you should waste your time considering why the kids did this, yet you have put considerable time and effort in forcibly rebuking those of us in this thread that have attempted to discuss and find answers to these questions, why?

grahamhobbs wrote:
You ask why you should waste your time considering why the kids did this, yet you have put considerable time and effort in forcibly rebuking those of us in this thread that have attempted to discuss and find answers to these questions, why?

Are there any answers .............I reckon you will only find excuses, the academics will spend years trying to find out what caused it, oh well, it will keep them in work especially if they get a government grant

The reason it happened was because a lot of the kids from broken homes, along with people who have spent most of their life on benefits and think everyone else owes them a living assumes that everyone who is not prepared to put up with life in the gutter, is different to them and should be smashed down

The funny thing is, they forget that without the people who are prepared to get off their a***e and do a days work........................actually provide their benefits

MKG wrote:
I've already posted a little bit about people who did what they had to do in the past. They complained, certainly, and possibly even kicked and screamed themselves - but I'm sure I don't have to tell you what they didn't do. They didn't because they recognised that, like it or not, any society has a bottom layer - even Utopia would have a bottom layer. The secret - although I see no reason why it should be a secret given that so many people have utilised it in the past - is to plough your way, using any legal method available, into a better position. That's what a free society is actually about - the ability to use one's own efforts to create change. There are a number of people who claim to be democrats who completely fail to understand this basic point.

Well, not my lot, I think most of my family a couple of generations back were born in the workhouse. If they'd had anything about them, though, I suppose they'd have been able to get themselves out of it. So I hope no-one complained about conditions or anything, because they could easily have used their own efforts to create change.

grahamhobbs wrote:MKG, sorry but you are doing it again. I have reread the posts again, I can find no one who has defended the actions of the rioters. Various people have tried to put it into a context, what is the background, why did it happen, etc. Trying to understand something is not to defend it. When the National Front or British Defence League march or make gains in elections, because I try to discuss and understand why young people support them, I am not defending them. Fascism is incomprehensible to me, as perhaps these rioters are to you, but I believe you can't change something unless you understand it.

You ask why you should waste your time considering why the kids did this, yet you have put considerable time and effort in forcibly rebuking those of us in this thread that have attempted to discuss and find answers to these questions, why?

Ah - now I see where you're coming from, Graham. Various people - and by that I must assume the ones with whom you agree - unfortunately have not tried to put it into a context. Rather than that, they have demanded that I do so. And they try to understand what has happened - well, good; I hope they reach their understanding soon. It probably won't be what I already understand to have happened and it probably won't agree with the context into which I put the whole thing. I have not done any of this in a knee-jerk reaction to events I don't like. It's simply that having thought about it, having read about it, having seen and heard what there is to see and hear, having spoken to people who live in the affected areas, in fact having gathered as much opinion and evidence as I am able to do, I have reached what I consider to be an understanding and an explanation. It may be somewhat hard to take that someone has come to conclusions with which other people may disagree, but that's a fact of life. At least I have an understanding to offer, something which is obviously being ignored as it doesn't fit the nebulous ideas of others.

What you are accusing me of is rebuking those who have actually reached no conclusions whatsoever but who still insist that everyone else's conclusions are in error. Well, I'm certainly going to disagree with the word "rebuke". I may put my arguments forcibly, but that's because I'm angry.

I think it may be advisable for many people to take their own advice - make a determined attempt to understand, but not to apply that to the perpetrators of an act, but rather its victims. In doing so, they may also gain an understanding of why the majority of members of this society are angry. Given countless previous examples of appeals for the understanding of criminal acts, that should keep them quiet until the turn of the next century.

I find it sad that anyone can be taken in by the tactics which have so often been used by woolly-minded social theorists. An appeal to delay any discussion, and certainly any action, concerning a criminal act in order to come to an understanding of circumstances is, despite what you say, a tacit defence of the act itself.

In short, I do understand what has gone on. It is, to me, blatantly obvious what has happened. I wish people would therefore cease asking me to try to reach an understanding - I'm already there.

Susie - I had two female ancestors in the workhouse. They both got out by dint of their own efforts - as, in fact, most females did. They took the lowest paid jobs available and went into service. Unless, of course, there was a riot in Berwick upon Tweed of which I'm unaware.

Mike

EDIT: Sorry, Graham - I didn't answer your question ...

"You ask why you should waste your time considering why the kids did this, yet you have put considerable time and effort in forcibly rebuking those of us in this thread that have attempted to discuss and find answers to these questions, why?"

I've highlighted what my basic response is. Despite the fact that I asked no such thing, you have insisted on putting the word "kids" in there and then attributed it to me. The evidence - the down-to-earth truth - is that the criminal acts were not perpetrated only by kids. I think you'll find that I pointed this out earlier. As I've said, I was rebuking no-one but, even if it could be so construed, I'm not in the habit of putting very emotive words into the mouths of other people.

MKG wrote:................................
Well, there we are, people - the understanding and explanation we've all been arguing about.

Mike

Yes, real people, real lives, sad but real. It didn't quite answer the question why now, why the gang culture (to the extent it is these days). It hinted at a reason that they didn't feel safe, nowhere safe to go. Now isn't that our responsibility.

Yes, I think we have agreement at last, Graham. I don't feel that the existence of such a thing is our responsibility - the author of the article implies pretty definitely that it's a self-created situation - but I think we have a responsibility to do something about it. The hard part is just what to do as, having created the sub-culture for themselves, they also appear to have very effectively ring-fenced it. The author got out through education but makes the point that education is rejected out of hand.

Maybe he actually tells us what should be done - target the leaders, get them behind bars for at least ten years, and then begin the work of making education acceptable - even desirable. And there's a propaganda war to fight - we have to remove the idea that criminality equates to respect. I have no idea how we go about doing that. But those gangs must go - there's that very interesting gestalt he brings up about it being the gang which is criminal rather than its individual members.

I fear that the only way may be a hard crack-down. Social workers being described as "wankers" tells us rather harshly how far that approach would go.

Well have been away and missed the "have a go at Mike" debate...(joke Julie!)

Civil disobedience does have it's place, as it's how we handle it that defines what out society is.

The "Alf Garnetts" of this world advocate strength in responce to these "Illegals and immigrants" The liberal Ruperts will tell us that we should really try to understand how these people feel, and hug a hoodie.

The facts are that there will always be "haves" and "Have nots"

I think the trouble was discusting, I also think that the responce to the clean up was amazing.

What I don't think any more is that this is about race. Saying it is is harking back 30 years and shows an ignorance of the facts.

Not that any of you are saying that I might add.

The solution? Strength, Unity, responsibily, Consistency and common sence.

Middle class Students Riot, Tree Hugging anti war protestors riot, Commy beardy types riot about capitalism. They are all met with a "dear me" and the Police criticed for trying to protect property, some working class chavs riot and we're all up in arms about how they were allowed for so long to get away with it, and how society is failing these little loves.

Thank God we have freedom of speech, freedom of choice, and we do live in a society, where progress is made from the cycle of "Adopt, Adapt, Improve"

It is time we all saw the centre ground as a place to be proud to stand, not as an excuse to pander to people.

Millymollymandy wrote:Bloody smilies, always being used. I hate them and they should be banned.
No I won't use a smiley because I've decided to turn into Boboff, as he's turned all nice all of a sudden. Grumble grumble.

Well I have just re-read all through this thread again and the biggest conclusion I can find is that the same people who always win in these situations are winning hands down again.........the ruling capitalist class.

Workers are fighting workers and from some of the posts on here, are spending too much time thinking up ever more imaginative ways to punish their class and egg on the state to even more oppressive knee-jerk laws with which to beat themselves down with. The media is having a field day whipping up this inter-class hatred to ever higher levels, encouraging vigilanteism and fighting between sections of every community. This stuff sells newspapers, it sells TV and it sells votes. It serves the interests of those who rule and those who make profit, which like everything, is what its really all about.

For those of you busy condemning the rioters without understanding the causes, it is purely about forstering the division within your own class and that only serves the interest of those who rule you.

I say again, I do NOT defend the actions of the individuals involved in the disorder. I am not in a position to judge them. If you believe these people as genuinely 'scum' the society in which we live is to blame if blame must be apportioned anywhere. A rotten society base utterly on the inhuman values of profit, greed and control is very likely to breed those and encourage those of the same values. I expect no better of those who have been shown at every turn they deserve no better. This is better put than I can in the Socialist Standard from a few years back:

"To find causes then we need to look beyond blaming individuals for the situation.... we shouldn't ignore the wider picture: the economic hardship of the majority inside capitalism, the atomised and alienated nature of much of our social interaction, and the anti-human values that flourish where profit comes first. We should perhaps not be surprised at the depths to which some stoop as adults when they have grown up in a society that materially and psychologically deprives and abuses humanity..."http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/feb09/page18.html

Capitalism has created the conditions which see events like we have witnessed in the last few days flourish. They occur with mind-numbing regularity all over the world. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer and with ill-educated, un-class-concious people who are outside the norms of society comes anger and frustration which ultimately end in violence, often as has been seen, mis-directed and uncontrolled in its nature.

Even the shop keepers, some of the most loudly proclaimed victims of the riots are seeing the true nature of the both the Police and the state and their roles within the capitalist system (which is not of government, justice and peacekeeping but of control and defence of the system of private property and profit).....

"...Another relative of the two brothers, Mohammed Shakiel lambasted the police for focusing their attentions on protecting big commercial buildings in the city rather than the livelihoods of small independent traders in the suburbs. He said: “These brothers were doing what the riot police should have been doing. They were protecting the streets, the police were busy protecting corporate businesses which are insured. These lives were not insured and we will never get them back...”http://www.birminghammail.net/news/birm ... -29222407/

There will I am sure be many arguments, much hand wringing and soul searching in the media in the coming days and weeks along with show trials and more. Our class will become more divided if we let them by taking sides and apportioning blame. The ruling class and their representatives in the state will continue with glee to watch while they are asked to implement ever more stringent laws and punitive responses against everybody.

But the constants will remain: the working classes will still be without and the capitalist class will still be with. The profit system will continue to rob us all on a scale far superior to any looting you've just witnessed. Cameroon and Co, while complaining about teenagers who smashed up shops here, will still be telling other teenagers to go and smash people's homes and shops and livelihoods up - only they will be doing it abroad in Iraq and Afghanistan with much better weapons and Government training, and meanwhile the men in suits who run the show will be sticking it to everyone for years to come yet.

Someone stated they don't know what the solution is? Well as I see it the riots are not a problem but a symptom: the problem is capitalism and the solution is Socialism.

For another similar view from a respected professor, albeit without drawing the same conclusion, read here:

I feel I should point out that the man who wrote the article posted above by Green Aura, a man who has lived it - you know, been there, done it, got the T-shirt - stated quite categorically that there was nothing political behind the riots.